Pie Five!

My brother-in-law and sister-in-law (the G's) have recently entered the fast-food franchise business.  Not McDonalds, Burger King, Subway, or any of those standard fast-food businesses, but they own five (?) Dickey's BBQ stores in Utah.

(The food there is awfully delicious.  Especially the mashed potatoes.  And the ribs.  And the chicken.  Oh, and Zee adores the mac'n'cheese, although Gee turns his nose up at it because it is not Kraft Macaroni and Cheese in the Blue Box. Such is my six-year-old's palate.)

But this post isn't about Dickey's BBQ.  This post is about something even nearer and dearer to my heart (and my children's hearts) than BBQ.

This post is about PIZZA.

Tomorrow is the Grand Opening of the first Pie Five Pizza restaurant in Utah (3158 East 6200 South Holladay, UT). (And it is the first franchised Pie Five anywhere, I believe. The only other place they are open is in Texas, where the company started.)  What is Pie Five, you ask?  It's a pizza shop that's kinda like Subway, in that all the ingredients are laid out for you behind glass.  You decide what type of crust you want, what sauce, what toppings, and they make your personal sized pizza right before your eyes.  Then, they pop it into this special oven, and five minutes later your pizza is piping hot, just as you like it.  They also have salads in bread bowls, and dessert pizzas as well.

Today was the "Friends and Family" day, where the restaurant staff have a dry run of all their tasks, and friends and family get to eat for free. So we trooped up there this afternoon to support our family and have a little pizza.

My kids thought they were in heaven.  Zee and Em, in particular, found a lot of joy in ordering their VERY. OWN. PIZZAS.  And putting whatever they wanted on it.  (Both wanted regular marinara sauce, regular mozzarella cheese, and pepperoni.  They like to live on the EDGE, people.)  Zee even went back and ordered another pizza for himself, without asking his dad or me.  In his defense, he logically did ask Aunt M., who owns the place.

I had the thin artisan crust, with alfredo sauce, mozzarella, chicken slices, artichokes, mushrooms, and spinach.  It was really, really good.  The perfect size for one person, even if you are hungry--I had one slice leftover.  Bradley had salad in a bread bowl, and he really liked it as well.

Not only did my kids get to order their own pizzas, and get free drinks (which we rarely indulge in), but they got to tour the back kitchen with Aunt M, and...this was the cherry on top...they got to be on LIVE TV.

You see, ABC Channel Four Utah was there, filming the live weather broadcast from the Pie Five store, and talking up the Grand Opening tomorrow.  Throughout the four and five o'clock news, the anchors would periodically check in with the weatherman Jim Kosek, and he would do little two minutes snippets on the weather, along with some longer interviews.  In between, Mr. Kosek and the camera man were just hanging around, chatting with people and (of course) eating pizza.

During one of those intervals, Gee started talking to Mr. Kosek and the cameraman, and basically thoroughly charmed them.  He showed them how he can whistle and hum at the same time (we call it the alien spacecraft), and talked about his new DAFOs (leg braces).  So when it was time for one of the little snippet updates, Mr. Kosek hunched down next to Gee and included him in the live shot, even letting Gee whistle and hum on camera.  Zee got in on it as well, talking about his delicious pizza.  They were both so thrilled, you'd have thought they'd won Oscars or something.  Gee, especially, has decided that he wants to be "on all the televisions all the time."  Heh heh.

Hebs missed out on all this, and was quite disappointed.  So, unbeknownst to me, Zee went up to Mr. Kosek and asked if, during one of the next snippets, Hebs could be on TV, too.  Mr. Kosek was wonderfully kind, and sure enough, let Hebs be on live TV for a couple of seconds to talk about his pizza.  (I have no idea what Hebs said, because I wasn't close enough to hear.  It was awfully cute looking, though.)

Now, because these are just the little snippets, they aren't recorded on the website (at least not anywhere I could find), but we did get to watch them as they happened, on the big TV on the wall in restaurant.  And my boys were so proud and excited and happy about it.  Gee and Zee can't want to tell their classmates about it tomorrow.

(You might wonder where Em was in all this.  Lurking in the background, so she was on TV as well, but she didn't care at all if she was "interviewed" or anything.  I wouldn't have thought that it would be that way, but that sweet girl constantly surprises me!  And naturally two-year-old Yum didn't notice or care.  She just danced around the room the whole time.)

We had a great evening up there in Holladay, and we are so grateful to the G's for inviting us!  And if you are ever in that area--right at the mouth of the Cottonwood Canyons--you should definitely stop in for a pizza.

(Do you think I need one of those blogger-disclosures about this?  I wasn't asked to write about Pie Five, but I did get free pizza.  But the opinions are my own.  And I still think you should go have some--it's really good.)